Benjamin Britten is the central figure of 20th-century English music, who revived the national operatic tradition that had lain dormant since the time of Purcell. His music combines clarity, craftsmanship, and deep humanism, often touching on themes of innocence, loneliness, and society's violence against the “other.”
His operas — “Peter Grimes,” “Billy Budd,” “The Turn of the Screw” — are among the most important in the 20th-century operatic repertoire. Britten, a committed pacifist, created the shattering “War Requiem” — a requiem-protest against the horrors of war. For young listeners he wrote “The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra.” Britten founded the famous Aldeburgh Festival. His work is testament that serious contemporary music can be at once deep, accessible, and acutely relevant.
